Attaching documents to a chat¶

In a chat with an assistant you can attach documents and images to your message, if the assistant allows it. The assistant reads a document and answers your questions about it in the same chat. This page says what happens after you attach a file.

Attaching a file¶

Choose the paperclip beside the message box, paste a file, or drop it on the chat window. Under the message box it says which kinds the assistant takes and how large they may be: PDF, Word, Excel, CSV and text as documents, PNG, JPEG, WebP and GIF as images, up to ten a message.

Waiting until the document is read¶

A document is uploaded first and read after that. While that runs, a spinner turns beside the file and it says Processing document…. You can send only once every document is read, so the assistant never answers before the text is there. A text file is usually ready at once; a long PDF can take a while. An image does not wait: the assistant sees the image itself.

When a document cannot be read¶

The file then says why, and Send stays off until you take the file away:

• This looks like a scan. A PDF made only of scanned pages has no text to read. Attach a version with text, or paste the text into your message.
• Too large to read, or this kind of document cannot be read: choose a smaller file or another format.
• Waits for the monthly budget: your organisation has reached its budget for this month. The document is read as soon as there is budget again.

What the assistant does not read¶

Pictures and scanned pages inside a document are not read. If you want the assistant to look at a chart, attach the chart as an image. Of a spreadsheet the assistant sees the columns and the number of rows, not the figures themselves; an assistant that may run code does calculate with the figures (Analysing a spreadsheet). A very long document the assistant reads in parts; feel free to ask about a particular chapter.

Each chat reads only its own documents¶

The assistant reads the documents of the chat you attached them in, and no documents from your other chats. When you delete a chat, OS deletes the files you attached in it too. In a very long chat that holds for the files in its first thousand messages and steps; later files go when your organisation's retention period ends.